Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey commissioned an independent review of security at state-run shelters and signaled an openness to residency requirements for the emergency assistance program after facing blowback for a lack of widespread criminal background checks in the system.

Gov. Healey said she was recently informed that CORI checks at Massachusetts shelters weren't happening. WBZ-TV's Tiffany Chan reports.

A spokesperson for the Healey administration said that the state was already conducting limited background checks on residents of the emergency assistance shelters, the governor has now ordered that the checks include a check against the Massachusetts Criminal Offender Record Information database. That process is often called a CORI check.

Whether it’s incompetence, intransigence, or negligence, changes must be made,” House Minority Leader Brad Jones said.

We’re going to get to the bottom of why that wasn’t happening,” Gov. Maura Healey vowed. The post Healey says she ordered criminal background checks on all shelter residents last spring, but they didn’t happen appeared first on Boston.

Maura Healey said Friday that it's "absolutely unacceptable" that criminal background checks she ordered last spring at Massachusetts shelters never happened. The Boston Globe reported Thursday that Healey's administration has not been conducting CORI (Criminal Offender Record Information) checks on people staying in the state's homeless shelters,

The state has been conducting searches for sex offenses and outstanding warrants — but not checks of past criminal activity.

Gov. Maura Healey ordered more thorough background checks be conducted for all residents of Massachusetts emergency assistance shelters in the wake of two high-profile arrests of shelter residents accused of serious crimes.